3. You can also contribute to the whole book right now and buy it at the low pre-edit-order cost of $9. CLICK HERE Once the book is ready, after the editors, you’ll get a Smashwords code to download your book and it’ll be available there for a keepsake. Now once the book is headed to the editor, the pre-order cost will go to $10. I know that’s just a dollar.

4. You can also tell others how much you enjoyed this story and share the main page of Black’s Innocence by go to:

This is a fundraiser. I know for my editor I’ll need about $800 to $1000 to give this story justice. I need all the help I can get and I hope to have an October release of Black’s Innocence.

Help me and thank you in advance.

Now my comments about the story:

This was a hard chapter to figure out.

In one moment, I really didn’t want to involve any more of Shadow’s life that’s happening outside ofthsi story, but I need Lauren to help Tyler, who’ll help King Heart, who in turn can get closer to gaining access to Detroit.

This is so I can finish up Emperor’s Heart and then work on rounding out King’s Paradise, Stealing Innocence III:Lethal Heart, and finally being able to work on Onyx’s story to face Blaque Heart.

If you haven’t read all my works, that may have sounded like Chinese to you, but if you have, you’ll understand why Lauren has to do her magic for Shadow.

Shadow must hide Paradise because you guys know if King Heart gets what he wants… we’ll just leave that thought open until King’s Paradise comes around.

Anyhoo, a lot of readers were angry about me giving Shadow over to King, but she was the only one who could help him, and then she needed to know the truth about where she really came from. (Which is the Longer story she’s hinting at in this chapter,but you’ll only know that if you’ve been reading Ravenous, right?)

… Enjoy

Black’s Innocence Chapter 39

“You scared the bejesus out of me,” Lauren said after clutching her chest.

Shadow moved more into the light and her face looked worse. “Really because I called your phone.” She winced on each step she took and it looked like it just hurt for her to move.

“Calling my phone and breaking in my house had nothing to do with each other,” Lauren said feeling angry and sorry for the way the young woman looked.

Shadow looked as if she just discovered this truth. “Next time I’ll leave a message to let you know I will see you soon with a busted ass face. How about that?”

“Who the hell did that to your face, Shadow?”

Shadow tried to grin but that just made her wince. “Unc needed to get out some frustration and also give me some practice with my Krav Maga. I had a lot on my mind. Ducked too late a lot.”

Lauren had to draw some lines when it came to her privacy with the young lady. “Shadow, the bottom line is that you are breaking and entering. That’s against the law and what your uncle is doing to you is called child abuse. You need to report him and get away from him as soon as possible.”

The young woman chuckled as if Lauren was just talking crazy. “We have to talk.”

Lauren went over to her bed and got under the covers. “I’ve had a long night, Shadow and I really don’t feel like talking to anyone.”

Shadow sat on the end of the bed. “Pregnancy usually does that to a woman.”

“I’m not pregnant, Shadow,” she disputed. “I took a test at the doctor’s office.”

“All doctor’s don’t always know the answer to everything and there are things like false/positives.”

“You’re smart in some areas, Shadow, but other areas, especially when it comes to adult issues you’re insane.”

“I didn’t come here to talk about your problems, I came here to talk about your three-way love triangle with Tyler and Dylan that’s holding up my problem. Tyler cannot function as long as you’re involved with Dylan. Have you thought of a way to get out of it or a way to get away from that hot mess? You really don’t need to be involved with the both of them.”

Rolling her eyes at the ridiculous accusation, Lauren defended herself. “I’m not in any love triangle, Shadow.”

“As a matter of fact, I’ve determined even though getting a divorce from him was the worse thing that’s happened to me, it was probably the best thing that could’ve happened to me.”

“So can you hurry up and get me more information on DevelopMoore, because I’m running out of bones to break? If we can connect all the players in DevelopMoore, I think we can push Tyler where he needs to be. That way Unc can get what he wants and I can get away from him.”

Lauren immediately empathized. “Shadow, I don’t know how to hurry anything up. DevelopMoore is run like a well-oiled machine. It’s so perfect they didn’t even cause a pothole with the IRS, which makes this all the more suspicious. No one’s perfect for the IRS for this long.”

For a moment, the young woman had an all hope is lost look but then gritted her teeth in determination. “So they are turning in employee records somewhere, right?” Shadow questioned.

Getting out of bed, Lauren walked into her office and turned on her laptop. Shadow followed and in a better light, her face looked even worse.

Trying to ignore Shadow’s bruises, Lauren pulled up the employee listings of DevelopMoore on the screen and then turned the computer screen to Shadow.

“Now pull up all current and past employees listed at the law firm.”

Lauren accessed those files and Shadow turned the screen all the way around so Lauren could see what Shadow could clearly see.

The seven employees at DevelopMoore were past employees of the law firm. “All of them were fired because they didn’t come back to work,” Lauren explained. “Maybe DevelopMoore hired them right under the firm’s nose.”

“All of them are reported missing. A vengeful detective in the Detroit Police Department is noseying about these employees houses. I have seen him and sooner or later he’s going to be on Tyler’s ass.” Shadow said pulling a paper out of her pocket, cursing under her breath. “I found this information from a public file at the police department. They have all been listed as missing for the past six years. Can you dig some more?”

“Sure,” Lauren said. “Let me see what I can find out. With their names, I can match up their files from the law firm and then see if I can run a trace.”

Shadow stood straight up and winced holding her stomach. “We’re running out of time. In a couple of weeks, the family will make a decision about Tyler. If we cannot give him what they want, he won’t be able to give my uncle what he needs.”“And what does that mean for you, Shadow?”

“It means I cannot leave my uncle and time is running out on keeping Paradise hidden from him. The more he can access Detroit, the closer he can get to her. If I can’t get away from him, I can’t help hide Paradise.”

“I’m getting my ass whooped because someone’s going to try to kill me and I need to defend myself. I’m being indebted to my uncle to try to help Paradise stay hidden. As long as I’m with him, I can let her know where he’s at, but I can’t help her if he has full access to Detroit.”

“Why does he want this woman so bad?” Lauren inquired.

“If you saw Paradise you’d understand… and her sister…” Shadow’s eyes rolled up and over as if lost for words. “Just trust me, thwarting my uncle from Paradise is better for everyone. He should never get what he wants, but he always does.”

“Sounds like Tyler.”

“Now you see why they are friends.”

“So why do you want Tyler to get what he wants if it’s going to help your uncle?”

“It’s a long story, Lauren, but if Tyler gets what he wants I can assure if Paradise is caught Tyler will feel indebted to help me out, which in turn will help her out.”

Lauren was starting to feel a little more overwhelmed and didn’t envy the stress this young woman must be going through. “Tomorrow, I should have some more for you, I promise.”

“One more favor,” Shadow said, looking at her watch. “I need you to call Deborah about one in the afternoon. Tell her you left a package at security and a messenger from Dwight Bowmen’s office is coming to pick it up. It’s the audit you were asked to do on the employees over the weekend.”

“Dwight is the accountant who did the first audit, right?”

“Yes, and Deborah knows he’s sour about you finding something that he didn’t find. She’ll start thinking he’s digging some more and most likely will desperately call other players to the mix to follow me.”

“What if she tries to see this package?”

Shadow smiled. “Don’t worry, there will be a package there, and Deborah’s going to make sure the package leaves, but I have a feeling someone’s going to try to make sure this package doesn’t make it to its destination.”

“You could get hurt.”

Snorting, Shadow said, “They’ll try, but I have a feeling Blaque would love to take that honor away from them and-” She suddenly stopped. “I gotta go. Someone’s coming.”

Lauren looked at the doorway to the office but didn’t hear anyone coming into her home. “It’s too late,” she said. “No one is coming.”

Shadow walked to the doorway and looked each way down the hallway and then walked away towards the kitchen.

Following where Shadow went, she saw car lights flash at her back windows, but then heard a click towards her front door.

“Shadow?” Lauren called out because the young woman had disappeared yet again.

Her phone rung abruptly and she hurried to answer it.

“Open the back door, Lauren,” Tyler demanded.

There was a slight slur to his words and Lauren was hesitant about opening the door because she had never really dealt with a drunk man before.

Usually, at college, she ignored the drunk guys knocking at her door in the middle of the night, but this was her boss.

Right now, she needed a job, but this was also Tyler Black, who was also her lover and a man she was still very much sexually indebted to, and anything was bound to happen.

Curiosity overwhelmed her and Lauren, holding her robe tight around her, found herself opening her back door to him.

A slow triumphant smile curled on his gorgeous lips and he looked her up and down.

Lauren pulled her robe tighter feeling more naked than she already was underneath the thin material.

“Good, you’re almost naked. This should be easier than I thought,” he proclaimed letting himself in and closing the door.

Lauren watched him turn the lock and she shuddered in a little fear wondering what was really on Tyler’s mind.

Published by @SylviaHubbard1

AUTHOR, MOTHER, SPEAKER, JOURNALIST, CONSULTANT & MORE!
Divorced Mother of three, Detroiter, Sylvia Hubbard, is not only an award winning best selling author of over 28 books, but also founder of one of Michigan's largest interactive literary community, The Motown Writers Network/The Michigan Literary Network.
View all posts by @SylviaHubbard1

So many questions and things left out there. Dylan is definitely up to something. Shadow keeps emphasizing that Lauren is pregnant and I believe Tyler also knows she’s pregnant with his child. Dylan is some how mixed up in DevelopMoore and want Tyler to fail. Blaque will probably make an appearance in this story. She will be there to protect Shadow or try to kill her. Like I said so much going on here. Wow!!!!

I wonder is King is training Shadow to help Blaque defeat Onyx. Make you wonder but isn’t Onyx Shadow’s real mother.